lief, it is related how Lord
Castlereagh in early life saw this spectre; as is well-known, he
afterwards became head of the government, but finally perished by his
own hand. Then there was the dreaded spectre of the Goblin Friar
associated with Newstead Abbey:

A monk, arrayed
In cowl and beads, and dusky garb, appeared,
Now in the moonlight, and now lapsed in shade,
With steps that trod as heavy, yet unheard--

This apparition was generally supposed to forebode evil to the member
of the family to whom it appeared, and its movements have thus been
poetically described by Lord Byron, who, it may be added, maintained
that he beheld this uncanny spectre before his ill-starred union with
Miss Millbanke:

By the marriage bed of their lords, 'tis said,
He flits on the bridal eve;
And 'tis held as faith, to their bed of death
He comes--but not to grieve.

When an heir is born, he is heard to mourn,
And when aught is to befall
That ancient line, in the pale moonshine
He walks from hall to hall.

His form you may trace, but not his face,
'Tis shadowed by his cowl;
But his eyes may be seen from the folds between,
And they seem of a parted soul.

An ancient Roman Catholic family in Yorkshire, of the name of
Middleton, is said to be apprised of the death of anyone of its
members by the appearance of a Benedictine nun, and Berry Pomeroy
Castle, Devonshire, was supposed to be haunted by the daughter of a
former baron, who bore a child to her own father, and afterwards
strangled the fruit of their incestuous intercourse. But, after death,
it seems this wretched woman could not rest, and whenever death was
about to visit the castle she was generally seen sadly wending her way
to the scene of her earthly crimes. According to another tradition,
there is a circular tower, called "Margaret's Tower," rising above
some broken steps that lead into a dismal vault, and the tale still
runs that, on certain evenings in the year, the spirit of the Ladye
Margaret, a young daughter of the house of Pomeroy, appears clad in
white on these steps, and, beckoning to the passers-by, lures them to
destruction into the dungeon ruin beneath them.

And, indeed, it would seem to have been a not infrequent occurrence
for family ghosts to warn the living when death was at hand--a piece
of superstition which has always held a prominent place in our
ho